Combatting Violence against Women and Girls - EIDHR brochure
In recent years and in many parts of the world, there have been unprecedented contestations of women’s status and rights; including the widespread use of rape as a weapon of war, and the proliferation of horrific forms of human trafficking, with women being enslaved or formally sold as goods.
Around the world millions of women and girls suffer discrimination simply for being women.
They often suffer double discrimination if they belong to a marginalised group or if they are
fleeing their country.
Violence against Women and Girls (VAWG) is one of the most pervasive forms of violence. It takes place in armed conflict but also through daily forms of violence. It is a global pandemic that affects all countries, all societies, all religions, faiths and ethnic backgrounds.
In 2008, with the adoption of dedicated “Guidelines on violence against women and girls”, the EU committed to take effective action against one of the major human rights violations of today’s world.
To do so, the EU agreed to address all forms of violence by mixing three intertwined approaches:
(i) the prevention of violence (ii) the protection and support for survivors and (iii) the prosecution of perpetrators.
Combatting Violence’s Against Women and Girls (VAWG) is therefore a priority of the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR). Between 2007 and 2013, over 420 projects worth 70 million Euro in total, were deployed to promote and protect women and girls’ rights across the world, either as a specific or as a secondary priority. They contributed to the empowerment and protection of these women and girls. They actively supported women’s human rights activists and gender equality advocates. Such an essential objective, as well as its necessary financial support, have been reinforced for 2014-2020.
This report highlights the added value of EIDHR activities in delivering against VAWG. It provides examples of projects fighting domestic and sexual violence (Part 1), preventing harmful practices such as infanticides, Female Genital Mutilation, or early marriage (Part 2), eradicating economic exploitation, trafficking and exposure (Part 3), combatting violence against women in armed conflict (Part 4) and supporting Women Human Rights Defenders (Part 5).
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